Department Chair Power and Faculty Compliance, Conflict,
and Empowerment at Mahidol University in Thailand

Songsri Soranastaporn
Thailand

Beginning in October 2002, Thai public universities will become "autonomous" institutions. While they will be expected to document outcomes and meet quality assurance guidelines, they will become free of centralized, bureaucratic state control and expected to operate in response to market forces, becoming less dependent on government funding and more dependent on monies raised through entrepreneurial effort. This change will have an effect on all aspects of university life, but it will have an especially noted impact on the faculty. Tenure will be eliminated and department chairs will be given more formal authority over faculty work.

In anticipation of this shift in power, this study determined how faculty members at one institution-Mahidol University-currently perceive department chair power and how those perceptions might affect three psychosocial aspects of faculty life: the sense of conflict they feel within the organization, the degree to which they feel empowered within the organization, and the degree to which they comply with the directions and wishes of their department chairs. Understanding current power relationships will provide useful baseline information that will help gauge the impact of the impending move to university autonomy on the faculty-department chair relationship.

This study investigated the relationship between the power of department chairs and the empowerment, compliance, and conflict felt by faculty members at one Thai public university (Mahidol University) in Thailand. Faculty sampled consisted of 551 faculty members at Mahidol University in Thailand. The Rahim Leader Power Inventory, The School Participant Empowerment Scale, the Compliance with Superior's Wishes Scale, and the Rahim Organization Conflict Inventory I were used as research tools, and the data obtained were computed to find the relationship between the power of depart-ment chairs and faculty members' empowerment, compliance, and conflict using a multiple regression analysis. The validity of the tools was verified, and a back-translation procedure was used to create Thai versions free of ambiguity and errors. The Thai versions were then field-tested. Questionnaires and letters of cooperation were mailed to faculty members. A return rate of 84.94% (468 out of 551 potential respondents) was obtained.

The results of data analysis showed that: (a) of the five power bases, expert power was the most effective power base in this study, followed by legitimate power and referent power; conversely, reward power and coercive power were ineffective in terms of influence; (b) expert power led to both attitudinal and behavioral compliance, whereas legitimate power led to only behavioral compliance; (c) though referent power led to attitudinal compliance, it also led to conflict; (d) reward power did not lead to compliance but led to empowerment; and (e) coercive power did not lead to compliance but led to conflict.